Superdelegate mystery

April 4, 2008 — Tiernan O Faolain

What’s with all this “mystery” some are trying to whip up or allege around Democratic Superdelegates? All they are is ex officio Convention delegates, not committed by a primary or caucus or State convention to any Presidential candidate. There are hundreds of them: How can you call them all “insiders” or “elites” or “party bosses”? They’re mostly elected officials, in either government office or party posts such as elected committeemen/women. They are the elected leadership of the Party officially or unofficially, and they are authorized by the current rules, adopted democratically a generation ago, to exercise free choice in hopefully helping guide all of us together, the Party and the American people, to victory in November.Many Democrats you can actually name are the Superdelegates, they just usually carry other titles, such as Congresswoman, Senator, Governor, Mayor, Chairperson, Committeeman, etc.

The consensus of the Party’s voters so far, or of the other candidates they voted for who are now endorsing one or the other surviving candidate, seems to be that we have two very good candidates left at this point in the process. This is a good thing! (The Repugs are stuck with McCain because they had only losers running!) If the nomination comes down to the Superdelegates, the rules allow us to trust them to add their judgment to our own in putting forward the best candidate in November, because we all want to win, we all need to win, now more than ever, for America and the world, for now and the future. There is way too much at stake here for each side within the Party to destroy the other, because we’re going to need each other to do our best together to keep the Republicans from stealing a third consecutive Presidency, and Congress also again! It’s a campaign, but winning must not be a pyrrhic victory, where one campaign destroys half the Party and the Christo-Fascists walk all over all of us and all of the American people, right back into the White House and the Capitol Building!

If it goes to the Convention, is that necessarily a bad thing? Imagine, a Convention that means something! Face-to-face democracy they dare to call “a brokered convention” and a “smoke-filled room”! In New England they call it a Town Meeting, and business-as-usual, not a “brokered town meeting” or a “smoke-filled town meeting”! They’re not really supposed to be meaningless week-long TV commercials after all, but Conventions — democratic, rule-of-law decision-making bodies of Our Party! Imagine, a political campaign as an ongoing civics lesson, not just devolving into one long fundraising-moneybegging commercial from now till Labor Day!